Great Langton is a small village and civil parish in the Hambleton District of North Yorkshire, England. The village lies on the B6271 road, between Scorton and Northallerton, on the northern bank of the River Swale and it was once known as Langton-upon-Swale. The village church is St Wilfrid's Church; there used to be also the Chapel of the Good Shepherd, which has now been converted into a residential property. There was once a school in Great Langton but it also closed and is now a residential property. The village pub, which was known as The Langton Hotel until it changed its name to The Wishing Well in the 1970s, closed in 2004. The village is a short distance from Kiplin Hall, the stately home built by George Calvert, 1st Baron Baltimore, the founder of Maryland. Etymology The name 'Great Langton' derives from Old English meaning ‘Long farm/settlement’. ‘Lang’ is the old Saxon word for ‘long’, and ‘Tun’ being ‘town’. It is known as Great Langton because there is a Little Langton nearby. Sites of interest Great Langton has a small number of Sites of Importance for Nature Conservation. These include Great Langton Pond located in grid reference SE289959, Poole's Waist at SE306943, River Swale at SE257966 and Winterwalk Wood at SE302955, in close vicinity to Little Langton. Great Langton Pond has many ornithological (wetland) purposes as well as plenty of decent angling. The pond is known to contain species such as Tench, Bream and Pike. The River Swale has been known to be subject to flooding and is monitored closely by the Environment Agency. Although Great Langton is located in a primary area for fishing, no local residents are in the trade. The River Swale also attracts large numbers of duck into the village, commonly seen around winter. The ducks tend to arrive around mid-September having travelled around from central CIS. They return around April, the journey taking several weeks. Poole's Waist is one of many oxbow lakes located on the River Swale. River water still floods through Poole's Waist during periods of high rainfall. History Great Langton shows signs of human activity throughout much of its postglacial history. Initially, in the late-glacial and early Holocene (Mesolithic) period, there is little sign of any human impacts on the landscape, but there are signs of forest fires shown by fire climax vegetation, which could have been prevalent as a result